


From Perdition

by Res



Category: Supernatural
Genre: Between Season 3 and 4, Castiel in Hell, Dean in Hell, Possibly Pre-Slash, Souls, Uriel is a dick, and raised you from Perdition, hurt!Dean, hurt!soul, i gripped you tight, souls are beautiful
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2016-04-14
Updated: 2016-04-14
Packaged: 2018-06-02 04:38:41
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 4,147
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/6551365
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Res/pseuds/Res
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Castiel retrieved the soul of the Righteous Man from Perdition; but what, exactly, does that mean?  (Also, Uriel is a dick.)</p>
            </blockquote>





	From Perdition

**Author's Note:**

> I wrote this YEARS ago, and somehow lost it. In clearing out my email box, I found it again! ....nearly 7 years after I wrote it. This story has stuck with me for seven years, nudging at me to try to find it. I am so glad to FINALLY find it again and share it, and I hope you enjoy it! (Found in my email from 7/24/09 - so I don't actually lose the date!)

When the call came, Castiel and his garrison were already ready -- they'd known something was happening, they'd _known_ the demons were planning something, but what, exactly….

Then, like a bolt of lightning, they _knew_ , and the horror of realization lent speed to their wings as they dove toward the Pit.

The demons were waiting, massed against them -- garrison after garrison of angels poured into the mouth of Hell, and washed up against the spiked wall of demonic hate and fury.  Angel after angel fell, and by the time Castiel's own troop arrived, the ground was hidden beneath the shattered remains of angel and demon alike.  His heart ached for the casualties, each angel an irreplaceable and priceless loss, a handmade creation of his Father's destroyed. But the call came to push on, push through -- without success, _all_ would be lost, not just a few, and to save that no price was too great.

And so they fought, and they pushed, and all around him angels -- his _brothers_ \-- fell and died, ripped to pieces at the hands of the demonic horde.

But they advanced, step by step, into Hell.  For 30 years, they advanced, step by step, and the losses were…uncountable, un _imaginable_ , but they advanced -- for a time, Castiel even thought, perhaps, they might actually succeed, they might achieve their goal before it was too late.

…and then it _was_ too late.  Every angel shuddered when the first seal broke, and every demon cheered. The agony of that breaking, that _shattering_ , drove the angels to their knees and cost several more angels their lives as the power of the demons grew, feeding off of triumph.

And, in his mind, a soft voice whispered to Castiel, one he had not heard since his Creation, _"Now, go now -- all is not lost.  You must go_ now _, Castiel, and save My child."_ And the angel remembered the prophecy, the one that stated that the soul who broke the seal was the only one who could stop Lucifer at the end -- the seal had broken, and now the situation was desperate.  The angels _must_ retrieve the soul, and keep it in their own hands, to have any chance at all of stopping the rise of the Fallen.  So he spread his wings and suddenly vaulted out of the ranks, ignoring the startled voices of his brethren as he abandoned them, dodging back, and then forward, darting through an opening given to him by the jubilation of the masses of the enemy -- the demons so focused on their celebration at the breaking that one angel, just one, was able to slip through before they realized the hole existed.

And Castiel fled, flying hard and fast, until he escaped the direct sight of the chasers before he suddenly withdrew into himself, drawing in his wings and _letting_ himself fall.  He landed hard, and forced the gracelessness, using the ground itself as a tool to smother his light, to rend his own body and wings until the pain screamed at him…and his light dimmed and flickered, to a level that would not be noticed.  He huddled down, into the muck and filth, the stench and despair, as the chasers raced around him, by him, hunting for an angel and completely dismissing the miserable soul that cowered away from their approach, burrowing deeper into the horror and slime at their feet. 

An angel would never lower itself so, certainly.

And Castiel waited.  For a long time, he waited, days, until the searchers gave up, returning to the front lines where, even here, he could hear the battle raging.

And then he waited some more, patient, careful, determined.  His Father had spoken to him -- he would not fail his Father.

More days passed.  Perhaps even weeks, or months.

Finally, slowly, cautiously, he began to move.  He looked, and he listened, and that inner voice whispered again, the faintest of touches, giving him a beacon to follow, showing him the signature light of the soul he was sent to fetch. It was dimmed, and flickering, even more so than his own light dimmed and flickered here in Hell -- there were moments when it seemed to fade completely, and in those moments, Castiel despaired…but kept on, following the path the beacon had laid for him before fading.

It took him years.  Years of hiding, of walking instead of flying, years of burrowing into the filth to hide, years to search and twist and track through the mazes of Hell, following a light he could not trust, into deeper and deeper layers of horror and abomination, pain, suffering, and misery, finding levels of terrors and atrocities even _he_ had not known could exist, and he had been a Warrior of God for millennia.  The miasma of despair and abomination got thicker the deeper he went, and the darkness grew nearly absolute -- he had to rend at his wings, his flesh, again and again to keep the light hidden in himself, had to smear more and more of the filth into the wounds and over himself to blend, and keep from notice as he quested. Even a Warrior of God had no chance here, not alone, should he attract attention; the battle progressed behind him, he could still hear it, even in these depths, and kept attention off of himself…but if they should find him, he was lost.

He _was_ lost -- the light had gone out again, and, this time, the darkness was so thick he could not find the path without it.

Castiel stopped, and waited -- the light would come back, he had _faith_ in this, even though he had not heard from the little voice since the beginning of this trek.  All around him were the screams and moans and cries of the damned -- behind him, he could hear his brothers dying; at this level of hell, the battle was not heard, but the death shrieks of each angel echoed, and echoed, all the way down.  Shudders rippled through him with each scream, every cry that meant another of his brethren had died.  Ten years, it had taken him to get this far -- ten years of being alone, ten years of listening to his brothers die behind him, while he hid and snuck and wallowed in filth, creeping ever lower into the worst punishment his Father could devise.

Almost, he doubted.  _Almost_ , he gave up -- and then, he saw it.  A flicker.  A brief, defiant spark…

Hastily, the angel launched himself at it -- it was so _close_!  How could he have not have seen it before!?  The soul was practically in front of him, but so lost in the darkness he hadn't seen it -- he didn't know how long he'd been standing there, practically on top of the devastated thing, listening to his brothers die, before he'd realized he'd reached his goal. Firmly, he set his hand into the soul and _yanked_ , pulling it close even as he let his light loose from the bonds he'd imposed, flooding himself with it, healing his wounds and throwing himself toward Heaven.

They heard him coming, his brothers, and, with one final, costly push, made a hole for him to slip through, up, and out of Hell, through the veils of Heaven and into the human World.

Only there, touching softly down in a centuries old hidden temple, at the top of a mountain close to God, did Castiel have the time to look at the soul he'd snatched.

For a long, horrible moment, he feared he'd been too late -- its light was extinguished, and all he held was a black, twisted wreck, irrecoverable and destroyed.  The lace of light was gone, the webs of life within the soul knotted and tangled, broken and cut, great wounds slashed into its surface, slicing deep.  Wounds old and new alike festered with rot and putrescence, and the whole of the soul was black, and lightless, stinking and heavy in his hands.  The horrors inflicted upon this soul were writ clearly across its surface, and carved into its essence -- and he watched, horrified, as new lacerations suddenly gaped open.

The soul was tearing at _itself_ , even as he watched, carving new and deeper wounds into its own essence, the tarry poison filling them and pouring out over the angel's hands, thick, black, stinking and caustic.  Castiel dropped the thing, and leaped backwards away from it, shocked and appalled at what he witnessed, his own soul-light flaring in automatic defense against the corruption.   His brothers had died for _this_ abomination!?  They had fought, and _died_ , for forty years, for this?  He, himself, had suffered ten years of degradation and toil, had slunk through filth and soil and corruption, all for _this_?!

Then, deep within the heart of the wrecked soul, a light pulsed, very faintly.

The brief flare lit up the lacework of life at the center of the soul, showing Castiel the briefest of glimpses of something…beautiful.  Holy.  And he remembered the words whispered, so long ago.  _Save My child._

This was a Child of God, and all was _not_ lost.  He was a Warrior of God and he would do his Father's will -- he _would_ save this child.

Hesitantly, carefully, he approached the thing once more, and examined it more closely.  It vibrated, broadcasting its pain and terror silently, even as it ripped at itself again -- and, this time, Castiel _saw._   The soul was cutting itself apart, literally -- severing the most damaged bits at the main arteries, and cutting off its own light to those parts, pulling its light deeper and deeper into itself as it went.

It was _hiding_ , retreating from _itself_ and the scars and memories carved into it's self, it's essence, by the time in Hell _,_ all sense of sentience gone from it, reacting entirely on blind instinct.  The poison dripping from each new wound, he could see now, came from deep within the soul; it was not being _added_ to the wounds, it was being _released_ from them.

As the soul ripped at itself once more, Castiel stepped forward -- he could see what the soul apparently could not recognize, that it was in danger of extinguishing the very light it was trying to protect, each cut digging deeper and deeper, closer and closer to the very heart of it.  If he did not act quickly, it would be too late and the soul would either kill itself or become irretrievably dark, for all eternity.  Fighting back his own revulsion, he lifted the soul, and began to work.

It fought him, at first; every wound he healed, it ripped open, deeper, and more raw.  Every twisted knot of life he carefully unwove, the soul scrambled into a knot again.  Castiel fought for patience -- he was a Warrior of God, not a Healer, and, while every angel could heal…he was not specifically designed for it, and the frustrations of working against a soul for its own healing were strong.  He struggled with it, soon forgetting the horrors on the exterior of the soul for the puzzle within it.  Carefully, he traced each branching path of light, from the inside out, mending breaks, sealing cuts, and untangling knots as he went, watching the light push further and further out from the center as he did so -- and then snarling in frustration when the soul would suddenly undo all his work with a single, deep cut, completely severing the branch of itself the angel was healing.

This went on for some time, the angel's frustrations growing to epic proportions -- until Castiel suddenly realized that the branches were not being completely cut off. As he watched, a dark lacing of the soul he'd just been untangling -- until the soul had cut that entire section off from its light -- slowly pulled in on itself and began to re-knot, tighter than before.  It was obvious the soul was still connected, that it still…felt…something from that part of itself.

Curious, the angel examined the soul more closely, lightly stroking over its surface, for once ignoring the filth the soul was soaked in, brushing it away to look, really _look_ , at the structure beneath it. 

At the _memories_ hidden under the filth, the memories of the soul's time in Hell -- what was done to it, and what it had done, there.  Experimentally, the angel tracked one of the memories -- a darker one, one that was easier to see in the tangle -- backward down the branching lace of life, healing in reverse this time, until he got to the light at the heart of the soul.

The reaction was…impressive, even Castiel had to admit.  Light flooded into the branch, brightening a whole section, and giving the angel a very brief glimpse of the soul's awesome potential -- so beautiful, so full of grace and light and song and possibility -- and there was the briefest moment of sentience -- real, actual, _consciousness_ on the part of the soul -- before the light hit the memories at the end of the path, and everything….exploded, Castiel thought, later, might be a good term.  At the time, though, the angel was too busy scrambling to label the experience.

The soul _shrieked_ and threw itself out of his hands, nearly Falling again before Castiel could catch it, and hold it tight. It fought him, savagely ripping at itself and the angel indiscriminately and tearing great rents in both of them before Castiel managed to subdue it.  Finally trapped, the thing shook and quivered, ripping at itself again and again until the light was forced back again, deep into the heart of it, undoing all the repairs Castiel had already managed, and tearing more and greater wounds into itself in the process, bleeding poison and corruption all over the angel's hands.

Castiel felt…disgust. Irritation.  At himself, yes, for being careless -- but, more, at the soul, as he watched it retreat into itself once more, undoing all the good he'd done.  And he…ached.  The wounds the soul had torn into him burned and throbbed with the poison pouring out from the soul's heart.  He would have to heal himself before he could help the soul again; perhaps it was for the best, he thought, as it would give him time to reconsider his approach.

Carefully, he set the soul in a safe place, and then he withdrew a bit -- still keeping a careful eye on his charge -- to begin healing himself.  As he focused on the wounds, his disgust with himself grew, turning into a faint loathing as he fought to purge the wounds and seal them.  He could not believe he'd been so foolish, so stupid, so careless, so --

So --

 _Poisoned._   Understanding struck, and the angel looked at the soul with new eyes.  He was poisoned -- with the soul's poison.  He was afflicted with the soul's own self-hatred, self-hatred spurred by the memories of its time in Hell.  It was not allowing him to heal it, because it could not bear the weight of the memories.  Hell was designed to break souls, and this soul had broken -- and it could not forgive itself for that.

Castiel was not sure he could forgive it for that, either -- not with his own memories so present, of the horrible slaughter and sacrifice needed to retrieve this horribly twisted thing.

He could not remove the memories -- they were a part of the soul's structure, now, and always would be; defining moments, every one of them, that made the soul what it was and what it would be.  He could not remove them without undermining the integrity of the soul and endangering its sanity -- but he could, briefly, muffle them.

"Forget," he breathed over the soul, muffling the memories of Hell in a soft fog, dulling their pain.  "Sleep and forget."  The soul would remember, eventually -- but the angel hoped it would remain forgetful long enough for him to finish healing it, and get it back into the world again.  Flesh would distance it from the memories, some, and help it to accept the healing. 

Castiel sighed and straightened, closing his eyes and forcing his attention back on himself again.  Carefully, he stitched his wounds, pouring the Light of God through himself to flush out the poison and refresh himself before turning his attention to his ward once more. 

This was proving significantly more difficult than he'd anticipated, and his patience was wearing thin.

After a few moments of prayer -- all right, maybe more than a _few_ if he was honest, and an angel must always be honest -- to refocus himself and cleanse the frustration and impatience from his light, Castiel approached the soul again.  Gently, he lifted it, and began his healing again, touch light and gentle as he began to trace each crystalline branching, easing the path of the light once more and lightly feeding it the Love of God from his own soul-light, to strengthen it when it faltered.

And as he worked, now that the soul was no longer fighting him, Castiel began to see the incredible intricacies of it, the delicate and fragile beauty woven into this creation of his Father's.  He could see how badly the soul had been damaged -- and how little of that damage was deserved, truly deserved, by the delicate thing he held in his hands.  The soft, tentative touches back -- almost shy -- as the soul explored the angel's own structure curiously even as Castiel worked his way patiently through the complexities of itself, were…gratifying.  Soothing, almost, though how the touch of such a damaged and corrupted soul could be soothing, Castiel did not know -- but he did notice how the soul flinched back from his touch as he thought that.  Sensitive, he realized, and amazingly receptive.  Immediately, he focused on the beauty of the bits he'd already fixed, and watched, fascinated, as the soul responded by brightening, and untangling a few of the knots itself, opening for him.

It was… amazing.  Castiel had never had an opportunity to examine a human soul so closely before -- he'd been set to watch, and to stay invisible.  The opportunity to…touch, and to affect, and to explore a soul was intoxicating, even as it was educational, and he wished he had more time to indulge himself in the examination.  Impatience was forgotten in his fascination, and the soul responded, again, and more, to the attention, almost basking, it seemed, in the light he poured into it, soaking it up as if….as if starved.  More and more of the life lacing was brightening as the soul basked under his touch, taking his light for its own and revealing breathtaking complexities at the heart of itself.  Castiel was pleased -- though the soul was still dark around the edges, still had wounds and knots, scars and sores, the center of it was brighter than he'd seen it yet, and pulsing brighter with every passing moment, opening itself to him, almost as if it were deliberately inviting him in, shyly showing him the beauties of itself, the pieces it had fought so hard to protect and save, as if rewarding him for his help.

"What in God's name are you doing, Castiel?  Is _that_ what we were sent to save?  That…that _thing_?"  The voice dripped revulsion and fury, and shocked Castiel out of his fascination, jarring him back into himself just in time to see the soul tighten in on itself and go dim in reaction.

Not dark -- there was too much light in it, now, for that, but it dimmed itself significantly, and sat, huddled and silent, in his hands, almost as if it were trying to hide once more.  Immediately, Castiel poured more of his own light over and into it, soothing, hoping to forestall any further self injury in reaction to the fright.  Softly, not taking his eyes from the soul, he answered the other, "It is frightened, Uriel, and it is damaged, hurt."  He glanced at the other angel, noting the fury still simmering there.  "You know that Hell broke it -- you cannot expect it to be pristine and shining after that.  It needs to heal."  He found himself staring at Uriel.  The contrast between his brother's life light and that of the soul was… shocking.

Uriel's soul light was strong, uncomplicated, straightforward.  After the complexities of the soul in his hands, Uriel looked…simple.  Oddly unfinished, which was a disturbing enough thought that Castiel flinched back from it, his eyes falling to the soul's complex beauties again, hungrily tracing the lace of light deeper and deeper into its depths. 

Then, he frowned, and looked closer as something caught his eye.

The fog he'd put on the memories was beginning to fade -- he'd expected that, naturally, and had known it was coming soon -- and, as expected, the soul was beginning to flinch back from those dark places.  But -- in the complete opposite of what he expected -- then it was _reaching out_ to those places, sending out angry little pulses of light from the heart of itself, and driving them into the darkness.  It was… trying to _heal_ _itself_ , now, he realized, pleased, and he fed it just a bit more of his own light, to help.

Its healing abilities were not nearly as strong as his own, and it made little progress as he watched, but it _did_ make progress, and Castiel was delighted by the realization.

And then the soul hit a particularly dark spot; a gash opened up in it, and poison squirted out, splattering both angels at once -- the majority of which landed on Uriel.  (Later, after Castiel had gotten to know the soul a little better, he often thought back on the incident and was not entirely certain that the unequal treatment had been an accident.)  Uriel snarled, and lunged at the soul, his light going dark and poisoned almost immediately, but Castiel pulled the soul into himself, shielding it with his wings even as he called the Light of God down to cleanse himself once more.  "Peace, brother!" he commanded the other.  "Peace -- we need this soul.  It is healing; that is all."

Uriel subsided, grumbling, and cleansed himself even as he cautiously moved back, out of splatter range.  "You had best get on with it, then -- this soul has already cost us too much."  He glared at the soul, bitter and angry, then looked at Castiel, eyes serious and grieving.  "We are all that is left of our garrison.  We are reassigned to Hesediel.  At least four other garrisons are gone -- perhaps more.  They are still reorganizing the survivors to fill the ranks."

It was a shock, enough of one to break the soul's fascination for Castiel, and he stared at it in horror as the full costs of this soul's salvation hit home.  _Garrisons_ of angels had died in the freeing of this soul in his arms.  The soul seemed to tighten again under his regard, closing off the light within and presenting only the horrible blackened scars to his gaze -- but he felt it tremble, slightly, in his grip, and felt the poison leaking like tears from the fresh wound. 

Before he could say anything, however, he felt the Call, and looked up, listening.  Then he turned and offered the soul to Uriel.  "I am summoned.  This soul needs to be put back into its physical shell -- you can do that."  He eyed Uriel with a fierce frown.  "Heal the shell, Uriel.  We need it whole."

The other angel grimaced, but nodded, reaching out to take the soul, handling it carelessly, disgust clear in his expression.  Castiel hesitated, torn -- but the Call came again and he had no choice.  Uriel would not disobey the Word of God, he was certain.  The soul would be returned to its body, and that body would be whole.  With one last touch, Castiel Marked the soul, placing a small sliver of his own Grace into the tangled weave, healing the wound that Uriel's regard had brought about.  Softly, he whispered to it, soothing, "I will find you again, little one.  Do not be afraid."

And then he vaulted into the air and vanished.

Uriel looked at the blackened soul in his hands, lip curling with revulsion as he shifted to hold it in his fingertips.  "You are disgusting," he told the soul, "I will do as I am told, but you are not worth what you have cost us."  He threw himself toward the World, landing on the pitiable gravesite with enough force to knock down acres of flora before throwing the soul back into the rotten body below.  He healed the wounds on the body and restored it to functionality, then shoved the soul into it and left.  Task complete.

Six feet under the earth, trapped in a plain pine box, Dean Winchester coughed to life.

**Author's Note:**

> (Seriously, there is no way in hell that CASTIEL was the one who left Dean to fight his way out of that pine box, no way. Uriel is a DICK.)
> 
>  
> 
> Thank you so much for reading this -- I really hope you enjoyed it! I would LOVE your feedback! Is it worth all the trouble it's given me over the years, wondering where it had gone?? (There is a possibility of a sequel, if I get enough inspiration/encouragement....I found where I had originally started one and its about half done. Need to think about it and see if it comes back. Hmm...)


End file.
